Pumpkin Chocolate Ice Cream Sandwiches

These tasty little treats are like the perfect fusion of summer and fall.

Ice cream = summer.

Pumpkin = fall.

Chocolate = year round.

Aren’t you relieved to have me here to outline those intricate equations? To be perfectly honest, I actually inhale pumpkin and ice cream all year round, too, so you can just disregard everything I’ve typed up to this point.

Any way you look at it, these delightful chocolate pumpkin cookies smashed together with vanilla ice cream are yummy. Really yummy. The cookies are unbelievably soft and although they firm up a bit in the freezer, they never get to the break-your-teeth-off point which is a bonus for an ice cream sandwich that needs to be eaten straight from the freezer.

I love the slight hint of cocoa in the pumpkin cookies and I don’t know why, but mini chocolate chips make everything a heck of a lot cuter than should be possibly allowed. Plus, how can you go wrong with an ice cream sandwich dotted with chilly chocolate bits? So if you are like me – digging in your heels and hanging on to the last glimpses of summer while still secretly yearning for your favorite season of fall, then these ice cream sandwiches will be the best of both worlds.

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

In a small bowl, whisk together the cocoa powder, flour, baking powder, pumpkin pie spice and salt. Set aside.

In a large bowl, combine the pumpkin, butter, granulated and brown sugar. Beat with an electric mixer (or in the bowl of an electric stand mixer) on medium speed until well blended. Add the eggs and vanilla and mix for 1-2 minutes.

Stir in the flour mixture until combined.

Drop the cookie batter by heaping tablespoonfuls onto lined (with silpat or parchment) baking sheets. Bake 14-15 minutes. Remove the cookies from the oven and press down on them while they are still hot with a flat-bottomed glass until they are about 1/4- to 1/2-inch thick. Remove to a wire rack to cool completely and repeat with the remaining dough.

Once the cookies have cooled completely, place the mini chocolate chips in a shallow dish or bowl. Place a heaping spoonful (about 3 tablespoons or so) of ice cream on the bottom of a cookie. Press the flat side of another cookie into the ice cream. Quickly, so the ice cream doesn’t melt too much, roll the edge of the ice cream sandwich in the mini chocolate chips (this is messy and if the chocolate chips are falling off, try pressing them into the sides with your fingers). Immediately place in the freezer while you proceed with the remaining cookies and ice cream.

Freeze for at least 2-3 hours or overnight. If desired, wrap each cookie in plastic wrap for longer storage.

If you don’t have pumpkin pie spice, use the following combination: 1 teaspoon cinnamon, 1/2 teaspoon ginger and 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg and 1/4 teaspoon cloves. Mix together and you have 2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice.

Notes:

The original recipe called for roasting the pumpkin puree (spreading it out on a greased, foil-lined baking sheet) for 20 minutes. I wanted to simplify so I left out that step but if you are looking for a more concentrated pumpkin flavor and have the time, go ahead and roast it and then let it cool before proceeding with the recipe. Also, it probably goes without saying but this recipe is easily halved.

Follow @melskitchencafe on Instagram and show me the recipes you are making from my blog using the hashtag #melskitchencafe. I love seeing all the goodness you are whipping up in your kitchens!

Recipe Source: adapted from a recipe sent to me by a longtime reader, Melissa H, recipe is originally from a Family Circle magazine (10/2009) – I increased the recipe to use a full can of pumpkin, changed up the method a little bit, subbed some of the white sugar for brown, etc.

17 comments on “Pumpkin Chocolate Ice Cream Sandwiches”

oh that was delicious I like that recipe
i love eating that’s why im too fat now 🙂
but most of the time what i eat are any kind of chocolates
like milk chocolate ,French macarons, and macarons london and so on.
well anyway that recipe above is interesting i wanna try that at home.

Hey Mel, I was wondering if you have done something different when you loaded your pictures up on your blog? I use Mac gourmet to keep all of my recipes and I am having a hard time moving the picture over.

Made these today!! If any reader is attempting these, here is a few words of advice:
1) Refrigerate your cookies “pre-ice-cream”. I left the cookies out quite awhile to cool, so I thought, and though they felt cool to me, I still ended up with a bit of a melty mess in my freezer. Next time, I’ll make sure those puppies are cold!
2) Once your whole sandwich is assembled, I suggest placing them on a cookie sheet/cake pan/etc. temporarily to store in the freezer. Just in case the ice cream does melt a little, it won’t end up everywhere.
3) I think Mel already said this, but I’ll say it as well, don’t worry about the wrapping them until after they have set in the freezer for a couple hours. It will save you from an unnecessary mess 😉
4) And just a suggestion, I think I might try roasting the pumpkin and maybe “upping” the pumpkin spice next time just to see the difference. These cookies have a bit more flour than normal cookies (it’s probably what keeps them soft, which is a must!) and I wonder if roasting the pumpkin will help cover that taste a little bit.
5)Yummm!!!!! I will make these again!

You know I love all of your recipes that I have ever tried (and now I am converting my newly married niece, too)! Are the cookies themselves ‘jar-worthy’ or do they need to have the ice cream addition? I promised my guys I’d keep the cookie jar here filled once a week with something. These sound delicious…

Shar – the cookies are good. But they become stellar with the ice cream. I don’t think I’d go to the work to make the cookies just by themselves unless I was going to make them into the ice cream sandwiches.

Just wanted to tell you that I’ve made the spinach soup twice and it was delicious. I made it the day you posted it and again yesterday. I calculated the calories using only half a tablespoon of olive oil and the entire recipe is less than 400 calories!

I’m not a big fan of pumpkin as a dessert. Actually, I’m not a big fan of any vegetable as dessert. Except maybe for carrot cake. Do you think you could figure out a way to use carrots instead of pumpkins and make something like a carrot-cake cookie?